A fingerboard is a working replica (about 1:8 scaled) of a skateboard that a person “rides” with their fingers, rather than their feet. The device itself is a scaled-down skateboard with graphics, trucks and plastic or ball bearing wheels, just like a skateboard.

Attention: Finger skateboarding is not a toy, it is just as challenging as traditional skateboarding, and requires long contact to complete each move.

Please watch the video first to understand the style of finger skateboarding.

History of fingerboard

Fingerboards first existed as homemade finger toys in the late 1960s and later became a novelty attached to keychains in skate shops.

Professional skateboarder Lance Mountain is widely credited for creating the first fingerboard. In the 1985, Powell-Peralta skateboarding video titled “Future Primitive,” Mountain brought fingerboarding to the skateboarders of the world in the mid-1980s. Around the same time, Mountain wrote an article on how to make fingerboards in TransWorld SKATEboarding magazine.In the video, Lance Mountain rode a homemade fingerboard in a double-bin sink. Some consider this the earliest fingerboard footage available for public viewing. That homemade fingerboard was built from wood, tubes, and toy train axles.

Fingerboarding is popular in Europe, Singapore, Asia and the United States, and there is growing popularity in Eastern Europe. It is a good match for videography as the action can be controlled and framing the activity offers opportunities for creativity. With the rise of the online video business from early 2006, fueled, in part, because the feature that allows e-mailing clips to friends, several thousand finger board and handboard videos can now be found on popular video-sharing sites such as YouTube.

Components

Similar to a skateboard, a fingerboard consists of several components:

• Deck: Fingerboard decks are made out of plastic or wood. The shapes vary from popsicle decks, cruiser decks and old school decks. Modern and/or higher quality decks have a defined nose and tail just like a real skateboard.
• Trucks: Trucks are mostly mass-produced from metal for the toy industry.
• Wheels: Wheels are made of plastic, metal or resin, widely spread is polyurethane (the same material used in skateboard wheels) as it gives a firm grip. Higher quality wheels are also equipped with bearings.
• Bearings: The bearings used in fingerboard wheels are also the same as skateboard wheels bearings. They are made of high quality steel to make the wheels spin smoothly, the same as skateboards.
• Tape: For better adhesion, a grip-tape is glued to the deck, which consists of either rubber, neoprene or fine-grain skateboard grip.
• Screws: Are the screws that attach the trucks to the deck.
• Nuts: The nuts ensure that the wheels stay on the trucks.
• Bushings: Like real skateboard trucks, fingerboard trucks have two bushings that usually smooths out riding the board.

How to play

If you are interested in finger skating, please refer to the video below and start your journey!